Jurnee Smollett Joins Taron Egerton to Solve Firebug Arson Mystery in Apple Drama From Dennis Lehane
Jurnee Smollett (Underground, Lovecraft Country) has been cast opposite Taron Egerton (Rocketman, Black Bird) in Firebug, an Apple TV+ drama written by Dennis Lehane (Black Bird).
“Loosely inspired by true events” (namely, notorious California arsonist John Leonard Orr), Firebug follows a troubled detective and an enigmatic arson investigator as they pursue the trails of two serial arsonists.
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Smollett will play Michelle, the aforementioned rising star detective, while Egerton as previously announced plays the arson investigator (and also serves as an executive producer on the project).
The fictional series, set in the contemporary Pacific Northwest, uses as its launching pad some events documented in truth.media’s Firebug podcast, which was hosted by Oscar and Emmy winner Kary Antholis (One Survivor Remembers).
Along with Lehane and Egerton, Antholis, Marc Smerling, Richard Plepler, Dan Friedkin and Bradley Thomas also serve as EPs on Firebug.
In addition to her roles as Lovecraft Country‘s Leti (for which she won a Lead actress Emmy nomination) and Underground‘s Rosalee, Smollett’s past TV credits include True Blood, Parenthood, The Defenders and Friday Night Lights.
Smollett was also expected to headline Lovecraft Country showrunner Misha Green’s Black Canary standalone movie spun off of Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey, which last we checked was still in development for Max (as of August 2022), though a lot has changed on the DC Universe front since then. (Of note, Green more than a year ago reportedly deleted all tweets about the Black Canary movie.)
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